Spatial compounding of 3-D ultrasound images

Abstract

In this paper we investigate the use of spatial compounding to reduce speckle in 3-D ultrasound. 3-D voxel arrays are reconstructed by compounding a large number of overlapping B-scans. The reconstruction algorithm uses a novel landmark-based registration technique to accurately register each B-scan as it is inserted into the voxel array. In a series of in-vitro and in-vivo trials, we demonstrate that 3-D spatial compounding is very effective for improving the signal to noise ratio, but correction of registration errors is essential.